Others have said that in Flanders they painted clothes and
trees extremely well, and some have maintained that in Italy they paint
the nude and symmetry or proportions better. And of others they say other
things. But my opinion is that he who knows how to draw well and merely
does a foot or a hand or a neck, can paint everything created in the
world; and yet there are painters who paint everything there is in the
world so imperfectly and so much without worth that it would be better not
to do it at all. One recognises the knowledge of a great man in the fear
with which he does a thing the more he understands it. And on the
contrary, the ignorance of others in the foolhardy daring with which they
fill pictures with what they know nothing about. There may be an excellent
master who has never painted more than a single figure, and without
painting anything more deserves more renown and honour than those who have
painted a thousand pictures: he knows better how to do what he has not
done than the others know what they do.
"And not only is this as I tell you, but there is another wonder which
seems greater, namely, that if a capable man merely makes a simple
outline, like a person about to begin something, he will at once be known
by it--if Apelles, as Apelles; if an ignorant painter, as an ignorant
painter. And there is no necessity for more, neither more time, nor more
experience, nor examination, for eyes which understand it and for those
who know that by a single straight line Apelles was distinguished from
Protogenes, immortal Greek painters.
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